This is Democracy – Episode 307: Deliberative Democracy

Jeremi and Zachary have a conversation with Gryffin Wilkens-Plumley about his work designing assemblies of independent citizen governance. They have an in-depth discussion of deliberative democracy, a practice that is about citizen's individual participation, reasoning, and sense of duty to vote and make decisions in society, and how it could apply to our democracy today. Jeremi sets the stage with some words by William James from 1897. Gryffin Wilkens-Plumley is a senior at Yale University and a deliberative-democracy designer. He currently works as Project Manager and Design Lead for the Connecticut Citizens’ Assembly initiative at the Connecticut Conference of Municipalities -- an initiative to hold the first ever official State-level citizens’ assembly in America. Gryffin's work focuses on citizen governance, designing assemblies for independent citizen governance, and working with funders and elected officials to turn designs into reality.